Description

This article illustrates the core concepts of the 'dynamic resource-system view' (DRSV) of strategy using some simple cases. Since this was written we have dropped this term and refer now simply to Strategy Dynamics as being based an a resource based view of strategy. Although written for an academic journal, it is hoped that some of the potential power of this rigorous, fact-based approach to developing strategy is apparent. Even this core of the strategic architecture is capable of capturing two critical features of business reality for many organisations:

that performance depends upon strategic resources, whose behaviour over time depends on rates of gain and loss, and

that performance of the entire system reflects what can be a complex web of interdependencies between these resources in a manner specific to each case.

Strategic plans and reports often fail to capture either of these fundamentals. That many companies do, somehow, manage to perform reasonably well is attributed more to the skill and intuition of experienced managers than to the value of many strategy tools. It is no longer sufficient to rely on the intuition of airline pilots to take us safely between the continents. Similarly, managers now need to adopt the dynamic approach to strategy more formally than in the past if they are to guide the enterprises on which people’s livelihoods and careers, even their health and family stability, depend.